SCIWAY News, No. 24 – December 1999

This issue of SCIWAY News is sponsored by the Online Gallery of John
Carroll Doyle, Charleston artist. Poster prints, limited edition
prints, and original oil paintings can be viewed and purchased though
the Gallery's Web site: http://www.johncdoyle.com.

SCIWAY News is a free, concise electronic newsletter that will keep you informed about what's happening on South Carolina's Information Highway. It is usually published once a month and spotlights new South Carolina websites and other noteworthy state online resources and services. If you find SCIWAY News useful, please forward this issue to others who are interested in South Carolina. But if you don't want to receive any more issues, just send the word "unsubscribe" to news@sciway.net.

Shop on the Internet ... at South Carolina Stores

In February of this year, we announced a new SCIway service called
buysouthcarolina.com (https://www.sciway.net/shop/). It features South
Carolina businesses that have websites where you can make online
purchases with a credit card ... or obtain complete pricing and ordering
information.

Buysouthcarolina.com started with 30 SC online businesses and now
includes more than 100. Please take some time to visit the South
Carolina merchants you'll find there. They offer distinctive products
that you can't find in discount stores or at Amazon.com.

I know that shopping online is convenient. But when we buy from
Amazon.com and its cousins, we send our money and our jobs straight to
the Northeast and the West Coast. So as much as possible, Buy South
Carolina!

If you own a South Carolina online business and are interested in
joining buysouthcarolina.com, you can find complete information at
https://www.sciway.net/join-us/.

Monitoring South Carolina Legislation--Automagically

If you have an interest in keeping up with what's happening in the South
Carolina General Assembly, you're going to like the new, free
"legislative activity tracking service" being offered by Legislative
Printing and Information Technology Resources (LPITR).

To subscribe to this service, go to http://scstatehouse.net/maintrk.htm - page no longer exists
and use the subject search and simple subscription form to indicate what
bills you want to track. You will then be automatically notified by
email whenever an action is taken concerning "your" bills.

You can also ask to be notified when legislative meetings or agendas are
changed.

There is no charge for this convenient, innovative service, and all you
need to use it is an email address.

Reporting New SC Employees Can Now Be Done Online

One of the results of recent Federal welfare reforms is that South
Carolina employers are now required to provide the name, address, and
social security number of newly hired or rehired employees to the SC
Department of Social Services' Child Support Enforcement Division (http://www.state.sc.us/dss/csed/).

This information will be used to ensure that parents who are supposed to
pay child support do so–which will help children and taxpayers.

To make it easier for employers to meet this new requirement, the Child
Support Enforcement Division has created a new Web site (http://scnewhire.com). It includes an online reporting form and complete instructions.

Much Better Consumer Tips!

We received lots of mail concerning last month's tip on how to handle
computer-dialed telephone solicitation calls (the ones that begin with a
brief silence). Most writers suggested better approaches. Here are
three of the best.

Carl Blum of Johns Island (Charleston County) writes: "We use a
different tactic at our house. As soon as we know that it is a
solicitation, we interrupt with our standard response: 'I'm sorry, we do
not accept these types of calls.' Then we hang up. We don't stay on
the line for their approval; we don't need it. And once we tell them
that we do not accept theses types of calls, they are legally obligated
not to call again, or face fines. We have found that the number of
calls we receive has gone way down."

Neila Rosenkranz of Cheraw (Chesterfield County) has had a similar
experience: "Telemarketing companies are now required to honor your
request to 'remove your name from their calling list.' If you state it
like this, they have to abide by your request. I have even had some
callers verify my name and phone number and assure me that my name is
being removed. I can also say that I have noticed a real decrease in
calls."

Karen Harper of Aiken recommends a proactive strategy: "I wrote
Telephone Preference Service, Direct Marketing Association, PO Box 9014,
Farmingdale, NY 11735-9014 and asked to be removed from telemarketing
lists. It took a while for my request to go into effect, but now I can
tell a big difference in the number of calls I receive. This does not
affect local organizations that call, just national groups and the phone
companies!"

Karen also explains how we can reduce paper junk mail: "Writing to Mail
Preference Service, Direct Marketing Association, P.O. Box 9008,
Farmingdale, NY 11735-9008 will help cut down on some of the junk mail
you receive. I don't think it's quite as effective as writing the
Telephone Preference Service, but I don't get nearly as many credit card
offers as I used to."

If you have some useful advice or consumer information that you would
like to share with other South Carolinians, please send a message to
news@sciway.net.

For Librarians Only

The Library of Congress recently assigned SCIWAY News the following
International Standard Serial Number (ISSN): 1527-3903. If you find
SCIWAY News useful, we would appreciate your adding it to your library's
catalog (or encouraging your cataloger to add it). Thanks!

SC Progress Report: Per Capita Personal Income, 1950-1998

Throughout our history, we South Carolinians have often become absorbed
in emotional public issues that have little to do with our long-term
well-being.

I would like to help change this ... because I think it's important that
we focus instead on fundamental, enduring concerns such as our
collective health and safety, jobs and income, the quality of our
environment, and our ability to compete and prosper in the decades
ahead.

To make it easier for all of us to see how we're doing, future issues of
SCIWAY News will include a new section called the "South Carolina
Progress Report." The heart of these small-dose reports will be simple
charts or graphs that compare South Carolina with other states ... or
different areas or groups within South Carolina.

If you would like to suggest subjects for future South Carolina Progress
Reports or contribute data, please write news@sciway.net.

Surprise of the Month: The Poinsettia's Palmetto Connection

Like millions of people throughout the United States, I have long
enjoyed the outburst of poinsettias we see every year at this time. But
I only recently learned that this popular flower is named for a South
Carolinian, Joel Roberts Poinsett.

The son of a French physician, Poinsett was born in Charleston in 1779.
He was educated in Connecticut, London, and Edinburgh, after which he
traveled for several years in Europe, Asia, and North America. Later he
served in the US military and in South Carolina's General Assembly.

Poinsett was also an ardent amateur botanist and maintained several
greenhouses on his Greenville plantations.

In 1825 President James Madison appointed Poinsett as the first United
States ambassador to Mexico. His primary mission was to buy Texas. He
did not succeed, but in December of 1828, while exploring the Mexican
countryside near Taxco, he "discovered" a tall, leggy bush with
brilliant red blooms. He immediately sent cuttings of the plant to
Greenville, where he began propagating them in his greenhouses and
distributing them to friends and botanical gardens.

Today the poinsettia (Euphorbia pulcherrima) is the top-selling potted
plant in the United States. It is grown primarily in California,
Florida, and Texas.

Poinsett was not popular in Mexico, and in 1829 the Mexican government
forced his recall. He returned to the United States and later served as
Secretary of War under President Martin Van Buren.

Unlike many South Carolina planters, Poinsett was a strong Unionist who
did not believe that states had the right to nullify Federal laws or
secede. He died in December 1851, nine years before the South Carolina
General Assembly passed the Ordinance of Secession.

If you would like to learn more about Joel Poinsett and poinsettias, I
recommend these sites:

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